128 A NATURAL HISTORY 



Allow here a few Remarks- upon the Nature of Milk and 

 ■ Eggs. 



I N all kinds of Vegetables is an oily Subftance, which is a Fluid 

 that Animals take in with their Food, and no vegetable Food is 

 nutrimental, without fome Proportion of this Oil ; even Grafs, 

 efpecially in its Seed, abounds therewith, which being thoroughly 

 mixt with the Saliva, it turns milky in the Stomach : Which dif- 

 fers from the Chyle, only as having been more concodled, and 

 containing a large degree of Salt, which renders it convertible in- 

 to Curd. 



MILK therefore is an oily vegetable Matter, circulated firft 

 in Plants, then in Animals, and capable of being reduced into a 

 cafeous and watry Subflance, (or Cheefe and Whey, if you pleafe.) 

 If Milk finds no opportunity of paffing off in its own natural 

 form, it turns to Fat, or goes away by Urine and Sweat, which 

 commonly is the caie in Men, for they generate Milk as well as 

 Women, &c. 



An Egg is from a certain animal Liquid, which by repeated 

 Circulations in the Body, arrives at a perfedl animal State ; this 

 Fluid comes from the oviparous Clafs, which is the White where- 

 in the Yolk appears to fwim. The White and Yolk of Eggs are 

 neither alkaline nor acid. 



Th e White difTolves by a gentle Heat, till it totally liquifies, 

 (thus the Hen's Heat gradually dilToives the White of a prolific 

 Egg into Nourishment for the Chicken) but if you expofe the White 

 to the Heat of boi It Jig Water, it v/ill immediately harden, into a 

 vifcous, dry Mafs. 



The White of an Egg is a furprizing Menftruum, for if it 

 be firfl: boiled hard in the Shell, and afterwards fufpended in the 

 Air by a Thread, it will refolve and drop down into an infipid 

 Liquor; which is that heterogeneous Menftruum fo much ufed 

 by Paracelfus, and will make a thorough Solution of Myrrh, which 

 is more than Water, Oils, or Fire itfelf can effed *. A^. B. The 

 White of an Egg, by a ftrong Diftillation, will afford an alkaline 

 Spirit, and will putrify by Digeftion ; and a fingle Grain of this 

 putrify'd Subftance taken, will, like Poifon, prefently caufe a 

 Naufea, Vomit, Diarrhoea, Fever.... ^% Bellini tells us he has 

 tried. And the learned Boerhaave himfelf, had feen thofe ter- 

 rible 



'■* Beerhaave's Trgcefs, p. 



